


where...

by tonight_aliv



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! GX
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-09
Updated: 2014-09-09
Packaged: 2018-02-16 17:06:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2277810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tonight_aliv/pseuds/tonight_aliv
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>competitorshipping; unexplored "Brave New World"-esq AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	where...

**Author's Note:**

> originally posted to tumblr on Oct 13th, 2013.

He awoke slowly, his heavy eyelids unwilling to yield against his itching eyes. He didn’t bother to move his arms from his torso, for their leaden weight was the only comfort of touch that he could comprehend. His body was lying on a sturdy surface that had clung to the shape of his back, and although it wasn’t soft, it wasn’t entirely uncomfortable, either. It was also warm, and it tried to draw him back into the depths of a heavy sleep.

He forced his eyes open, kept them open, tried to parse through a darkness so much deeper than he had ever seen before. His next breaths grew labored, panicked, until abruptly quieted by the rough scratching of wood against concrete.

"Juudai, you’re awake!"

Strong hands grabbed his shoulders. Johan’s hands. Johan’s voice. Johan’s smell, although something wasn’t quite right about it. Juudai’s dark eyebrows knitted together on his forehead as he realized it all, his consciousness still weighed down by a drowsiness that would not relinquish him, no matter how hard he fought.

"J-Johan," he managed to whisper, realizing the his throat was too dry and his lips were chapped and the muscles in his face were too stiff to say much at all, "Where—?"

The hand on his right shoulder moved to cup his cheek, to still his jaw and trace a thumb over Juudai’s cheekbone. It was soothing, too soothing, and Judai almost allowed his eyes to close again, since he could see nothing but darkness anyway, despite Johan’s proximity.

His breathing slowed, but his worry grew. The alarm that had tried its best to awaken his senses had abated slightly, and with his heartbeat no longer racing, Juudai began taking in what information he could from his other senses: the air reeked of sterility, there was a light hum of a machine to his right, and a few needles and tape itched at his forearm, his neck, his thigh. He was covered with a woolen blanket and nothing else.

Johan didn’t answer his question, or what he had managed to form of a question. Instead, Johan persistently brushed his thumb against Juudai’s cheek, his other hand gripping Juudai’s shoulder a little tighter.

"Wher—" he started, but his voice cracked and fell away from him with his next exhale. His eyelids began to fall again with his fatigue, but he blinked them back open again, almost afraid of falling back asleep.

"He’s still under heavy sedation," another voice said from across the room, and Juudai drew a sharp breath when he placed it, "Let him rest, Johan. It’s better that he’s not awake yet, anyw—"

"Manjoume!" Juudai interrupted, throwing the rest of his strength into the name. His eyes drifted closed as he tried to catch his breath from the yell, and with a determination that he would not have gathered had Johan not been here, touching him and comforting him and giving this much needed warmth so freely, Juudai extended one of his hands away from its rest on his torso, reaching blindly into the darkness.

His head turned in the direction of his outstretched arm as Jun slowly took his hand, cradling it in his own cold grasp. Johan had taken the opportunity to brush his fingers into Juudai’s brown hair, to press his softened lips against Juudai’s temple.

It was then, with Johan’s face so close to his, that Juudai mouthed his question into something that might have formed a whisper, had he not been walking the thin line between consciousness and dream:

_"Where… is… Yubel?"_

And in that instant, he fell away from their touches, from his labored breathing, from a world just as dark as the one here, behind closed eyelids.

_Where are you?_


End file.
